


Suprise Surprise

by fenellaevangela



Category: The Orville (TV)
Genre: Developing Relationship, Eggpreg, I didn't know I was pregnant, M/M, past dub-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-15
Updated: 2019-04-15
Packaged: 2020-01-13 15:50:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18472105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fenellaevangela/pseuds/fenellaevangela
Summary: Darulio shows up onThe Orvillewith some shocking news.





	Suprise Surprise

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wearestardust](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wearestardust/gifts).



Ed didn't even wait until he reached his desk. He wanted this conversation to be over sooner rather than later, so he got it started while the door to his office was still sliding shut behind them.

"Okay," he said. "Tell us whatever you're here to say and make it quick."

"Look, it's about my heat."

Because that's the thing.

Darulio was back.

Ed would rather have never seen Darulio again, let alone speak with the man, and it was a big enough galaxy that he didn't see why he should have to. But someone somewhere must have it out for him, because when the Orville docked at Alvari Station for a scheduled supply pick up Darulio had been there specifically waiting for them.

"Oh, thank the three moons I tracked you down!" Darulio had exclaimed, after using a confused ensign to lure both Ed and Kelly to the loading bay with word of 'sensitive intelligence'. "The three of us need to talk."

"Absolutely not," had been Ed's answer. It was clear and to the point - and _much_ more restrained than what he really wanted to say - but it hadn't stopped Darulio.

"No, really. This might be nothing, but if it's not nothing then you'll want to know. Will you at least hear me out?"

Ed, already fed up, turned away and called for Lt. Keyali to strong arm Darulio off his ship, but Kelly had continued. "I think I speak for both of us when I say that whatever you want us to know can be sent to the Orville through official channels, and if it's really that important, we'll hear about it."

"Sure, yeah, I thought about doing that. But it's kind of what you humans would consider, uh, personal? I thought you'd appreciate me being discreet about, you know," Darulio gestured broadly between the three of them. "Sex stuff."

Ed had turned back at that, then towards the entrance to the loading bay where Lt. Keyali had just arrived. He signalled for her to stay back.

"I don't see what there is for us to discuss about . . . that," he said.

Darulio had found his hook, and he knew it. "I'll tell you. In private."

~

And so here they were. Ed at his desk, Kelly standing beside him, and Darulio across from them.

"Can we get to the point already?" Kelly said. "Why should we even be listening to you after how you treated us both?”

Darulio held up his hands. "All right, all right! The thing is, my species is supposed to go into heat every year."

"We know," said Ed. Boy, did they ever.

"Sure. Except this year I didn't. So I go have a checkup, make things are on the up and up and, well," Darulio paused, like he's reluctant to tell them after all. "There's one pretty common reason why someone might miss a heat . . . It turns out I must have spawned within the last year without realizing it. Whoops?"

" _Spawned_?" Ed blurted out. Kelly gave him a look, but he just gave her one back because come _on_.

Darulio ignored their silent exchange and continued. "I guess that's not how humans do it, huh? It means I implanted my eggs in a partner, where they'll be fertilized by the host's genetic material and gestate for about one Retepsian cycle or so. I won't have another heat until my children are old enough to walk, but what's really got me stressed is that I had no idea it happened! It's a total faux pas. I'm so embarrassed, and to top it off, I've been worried sick about the eggs! You can imagine, I'm sure." 

"Uh huh. What does this mean, for us? Why are you here?" Kelly asksed and God, Ed had a bad feeling that he knew where this was going.

The look on Darulio's face only made the feeling worse.

"Well, I'm trying to track my children down. I've already spoken to my other sexual partners from the right time period and none of them are carrying, so . . . that just leaves the two of you."

Okay, no, never mind. Ed couldn't believe this was really happening.

"I hate to say you came all this way for nothing, but I think you've got the wrong people," he says. "I can't speak for Kelly, but I've been to the sick bay for plenty of different reasons since we had sex, Darulio. It's been a year. I think Dr. Finn would have noticed if I'd managed to get _pregnant_."

Darulio looked skeptical. "Would she, though? I don't mean to cast aspersions on members of your crew, but do _any_ of your doctors have experience with Retepsian obstetrics?"

Ed scoffed, but when he looked to Kelly for support she actually seemed to be considering it.

"Kell!"

Kelly bit her bottom lip. "I mean, if she didn't know what to look for . . ."

~

"What the _fuck_."

It was lucky that sick bay wasn't very busy, because that meant Ed's outburst didn't get much of an audience. It's not great for morale when the captain loses his cool.

Dr. Finn frowned at her scanner. "I'm sorry, Captain. I should have noticed them months ago, but I'm afraid Darulio's right; according to these scans, you're carrying three Retepsian eggs in an advanced stage of gestation. Here, look,” she said, and tilted her scanner towards Ed for a moment. Part of the display was an image, but he couldn't quite figure out what he was seeing before Dr. Finn straightened up again. “It's remarkable - the eggs seem to have used surrounding non-gamete cells both for fertilization and to mask themselves from your immune system. That must be how our previous scans missed them, as well."

There were a lot of questions running through Ed's mind, but touching his stomach – his _flat_ stomach, middle-aged spread aside - he latched ont o one in particular.

"I don't even look pregnant!” he said. “How can they be at an advanced stage of gestation?”

"Um, if I could butt in?" Darulio asked.

Dr. Finn looked to Ed, who tensed. The only reason he even allowed Darulio in the room for this was in case he had any relevant information, so Ed supposed he couldn't say no now.

"Yes, fine, what?"

"Retepsian eggs are only about the size of a fist when lain," Darulio explained, then shocked Ed by actually taking Ed's hand in both of his own and gently folding it into a fist. "See? It's not so big, is it? You'd barely notice three of these, wouldn't you?"

Ed looked from his fist, cradled in Darulio's hands, up to Darulio's face. Darulio was smiling softly and Ed remembered with a pang that he had seemed to genuinely care about the eggs. His children.

Ed's children.

 _Fuck_.

"Your young must be pretty small," Ed said, after a moment too long.

Darulio released Ed's hand, although he didn't step out of Ed's space.

"Not that small, really," he said. "They get to grow a bit more before hatching; the eggs are soft-shelled, so they can expand. But . . . I suppose you'll get to see for yourself?"

There was more bubbling beneath the surface of that question than Ed was prepared to even think about right now. He cleared his throat and looked over towards Dr. Finn - had he been staring into Darulio's eyes this whole time? - before answering.

“I think there'll probably be plenty of time for you to get the eggs back to Retepsia before they hatch.”

“Oh,” was all Darulio said. 

Ed knew he didn't have to explain himself, but he felt the urge anyway. “I just – I'm not - ”

“Yes, of course. I get it,” said Darulio. He stepped away from Ed and gestured towards the sick bay doors. “Hey, why don't I get out of here, give you a little time to process the whole thing. All right?”

Ed was going to need more than just a little time to wrap his head around all this.

~

“Okay, wait, wait.” Gordon set down his beer. “You slept with Darulio again?”

Ed had, in fact, needed to take the rest of the day off. Kelly had all but ordered him to leave the Orville to her until he felt ready to return to work, and since they planned to stay docked at Alvari Station for a few days Ed felt no compunctions about agreeing. He had started out brooding alone in his quarters, until he remembered the double connotations of 'brooding', had a minor panic attack, and called Gordon.

Ed groaned around a sip of his own drink. “ _No_. God, no. This happened, uh, last time.”

“Last time? A year ago?” As if he might have missed seeing a rounded belly, Gordon gave Ed's midrift a once-over. “You do _not_ look a year pregnant, dude.”

“Yeah, well, apparently Retepsian eggs are pretty small. At least that's one thing I don't have to worry about.”

Gordon finished his drink and got up to get another. Ed definitely agreed that this was more than just a one drink situation.

“I don't know,” Gordon said. He grabbed another bottle for Ed as well and brought it over. “Isn't it weirder that you don't look pregnant? At least then you'd _know_ , right? If you don't look pregnant, and you don't feel pregnant, I think I'd forget there was an actual baby – egg baby - ”

Ed jerked his bottle of beer away from his mouth so abruptly that some of the liquid sloshed out over the rim.

“Wait,” he said, holding his drink away from him like it was a bomb. “Should I not be drinking?”

Gordon winced. “Uh, I think that ship has sailed? We had drinks last week, too, and the week before that . . .”

“Well, shit,” Ed said. He hadn't even thought about that. Were there other things he'd been doing for the last year that might have impacted the eggs? He should have asked Dr. Finn for a closer examination but the idea hadn't occurred to him. No wonder Darulio had been concerned about the eggs' safety.

“Hey, it's okay. I'm sure the Doc can set everything right,” Gordon assured him. “Heck, if you're really that far along she could probably remove them now without any - ”

“What?” Ed responded without even thinking. “No!”

Gordon's eyebrows shot up. “Whoa, sorry, man. I'm just saying, you know, you've got options! You don't need to do anything you don't want to do!”

Ed sighed. “You're right, I didn't mean to snap. It's just – the eggs are almost to term, anyway. I might as well follow through.”

“You're definitely going through with it, then? Like,” Gordon made a gesture broadly suggestive of birth, “all the way?”

Ed nodded. The thought kind of made him sick – actually, physically nauseated. The fact that he was carrying three eggs was bizarre enough, but the realization that soon enough he was going to have to _un_ carry them felt totally unreal. 

Gordon gave a low whistle. “Wow. Honestly? I don't think I could do that, Ed. It's too weird.”

Weird was an understatement. Ed slumped down and let his head rest on the back of the couch. He looked up at the ceiling as he spoke.

“I didn't think I could, either. When Bortus had Topa? I remember being _glad_ that that was never going to be me. It still freaks me out. But . . .”

“What?” Gordon asked.

Ed turned his head towards his friend. “You've gotta keep this between us, all right?”

“Of course, man.”

“The way Darulio talked about, you know, them,” Ed said, skimming his fingers across the hem of his shirt. “It really hit me how important this must be to him. It made me want to give them the best chance, if that makes sense? He really seems to want to be a good father, if you can believe it.”

“Yeah? I never would've guessed the guy who broke up your marriage was a family man, but that's good,” said Gordon. “They are his kids, after all.”

“Exactly,” said Ed. 

Fuck.

~

That night Ed slept fitfully, tossing and turning with dreams he wouldn't remember the next day, and when he woke up he had one hand spread out over his stomach.

~

A few days spent alternating between overthinking his situation in his quarters and being increasingly unnerved by each new test Dr. Finn ran on him was more than enough downtime for Ed. Although Dr. Finn and Kelly had both been wary about seeing him back on duty when the eggs could come at any time – Retepsians were great at hybridizing, but there'd never been a Retepsian-Human pregnancy before so even Darulio couldn't give a good guess at when Ed was due – Ed knew he would go stir crazy if he just had to sit around and wait.

Being back to work took his mind off it all almost instantly. When the eggs had been all he could think about it had seemed absurd that he could be _pregnant_ for almost a _year_ and never notice it, but once Ed was back on the bridge it all made sense to him; he didn't really feel pregnant – not how he expected a pregnancy to feel – so when he kept his mind on his work he was almost able to forget his impending lifetime event. It was a relief.

Or it was, until Darulio showed up in Ed's office a week after first meeting the Orville at Alvari Station.

Ed knew that Dr. Finn had spoken with Darulio several times during that timeframe – about Retepsian genetics, about questions Ed had passed along, about Darulio's plans for transporting the eggs safely – but Ed himself hadn't seen Darulio since that first day in sick bay. It had been a silent agreement between them, and Ed was surprised to see Darulio now.

“Can we talk?” Darulio asked.

Ed invited Darulio in. “If you insist.”

“I've had a lot of time to think since I got here,” Darulio told Ed. “It turns out not a lot of people on this ship feel comfortable socializing with Retepsians – or maybe it's just me they have a problem with.”

“I can't imagine why,” said Ed, voice flat.

Darulio sighed. “See? I knew this had to do with my whole thing with you and Kelly.”

“Are you saying you're surprised?” Ed asked. “Crews talk, and your story isn't a flattering one.”

“What I'm saying,” Darulio pressed on, “is that before I came back here, I don't think I realized quite how deeply I'd upset you.”

Ed scoffed. “Seriously? I didn't think I was being subtle. I wouldn't even be entertaining this conversation if circumstances weren't . . . complicated.”

“I get that, and it's sort of my point,” Darulio said. “The eggs were an accident and I think you understand that, but I realize now that we never ended up on the same wavelength about my heat. The whole situation felt normal to me and I never totally got how it made you and Kelly feel, not really. So I just wanted to apologize again.”

“Fine. Are you done?”

Darulio nodded. “I guess I am.”

“Great,” said Ed, dismissing him.

Darulio started to leave, but turned back right before he reached the door.

“Were you happy, at least?” he asked. “At the time, I mean. We were happy, right? I know _I_ liked you.”

Ed leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “I don't see how that's relevant.”

“Those were real feelings,” Darulio insisted. “Our heats are how Retepsians initiate mating bonds.”

“Can the feelings really be real if they fade away?” said Ed.

Darulio shrugged. “Were your feelings for Kelly real, once they changed?”

“That's not the same.”

“Maybe it doesn't seem that way, to a human,” Darulio said. And he left before Ed could ask him what exactly he meant by that.

Ed and Kelly had been _in love_.

~

But what did it _mean_?

~

“Darulio?” Ed called. “Are you there?”

There were a few beats of silence before the other man's voice came over the comms.

“Ed? It's - _late_ ,” Darulio said. “Is everything all right? Are you okay?”

God, it really was late. Ed hadn't even looked at the time when he reached for his communicator.

“Shit, never mind, I didn't mean to wake you - ”

“No, wait,” Darulio said. “Ed, why did you call me?”

Ed swallowed. “It's nothing. I just, I feel sick.”

When he actually thought about it, Ed didn't know why he'd called for Darulio. He probably should have contacted sick bay if he was really worried – and he kind of was, this felt _weird_ \- but when he'd picked up his communicator . . .

“You know what, I'm just going to go to sick bay. You should go back to sleep.”

“No, I'm going to come and get you,” Darulio told him. A tension eased inside of Ed; that was exactly what he'd needed to hear. “Are you okay to wait?”

“I can wait,” Ed agreed.

“I'll be there as soon as I can,” was Darulio's answer, and then Ed's communicator went silent.

Ed stayed in bed while he waited for Darulio to arrive, staring at the ceiling in the dark because he hadn't even turned the light on before grabbing his comm. What was he doing? He had just woken up, and his stomach had felt tight and uncomfortable, and he hadn't even thought about it before comming Darulio.

 _Darulio_ , of all people.

He didn't have much time to wonder about it before his door chimed and Darulio was there, crossing the distance from Ed's bedroom door and ordering on the lights on his way.

“How are you feeling?” Darulio asked, kneeling down next to Ed's bed. 

Ed pushed aside how odd the situation felt, and answered truthfully. “My stomach feels uncomfortable. It woke me up.”

“Uncomfortable how?”

“Tight - ” Ed said, and before the word was out of his mouth Darulio had pulled Ed's blanket down and away from his body. Then he reached out to touch Ed's stomach and – oh. That was _worse_.

“Stop,” he said. “I think I'm going to be sick.”

Darulio moved his hand away. “Ed – I think it's the eggs. I think they're coming. It's time.”

Ed's stomach flipped at the suggestion. Logically, of course, he'd known there was a good chance that was what was happening, but he still balked at the idea.

“It's not. It doesn't hurt,” he insisted. “I'm just nauseous. So it's not.”

Darulio shook his head. “It shouldn't hurt. They're small, remember? Just a fist.”

Darulio moved cautiously, like he was worried that he'd spook Ed away, and Ed didn't blame him for it, either; he could feel the panic building up inside him. But slowly, carefully, Darulio reached out to take hold of Ed's hand. Just like on that first day, he folded it into a fist.

“See?” he said. “It's going to be easy.”

“I'm not ready,” Ed admitted, and fuck, he really wasn't. Not to have these kids – his kids, Darulio's kids - or to send them away, either. He wasn't ready to _choose_.

And then Darulio surprised him.

“Hey, neither am I,” he said.

“What?” Ed asked. “But, this is why you're here. You tracked the Orville down just so you could find your eggs - these eggs. This is the moment you've been waiting for.”

Darulio shook his head. “That doesn't mean I'm not scared.”

That was when Ed realized it. He was looking into Darulio's eyes, Darulio holding onto his hand, and he suddenly knew.

“I want to see them.” Ed's voice was shaking. “When they hatch – I want to see them. Will you stay? Please?”

Darulio stared back at him.

~

Maybe it could the the same after all. 


End file.
